Humans, Angels, and Everything in Between
by Winged'Pollution
Summary: Charmeine, an angel who studies humanity and humankind, is recruited by Castiel to keep an eye on the boys while he's away. A series of half drabbles, mini stories, stuff like that. Possible Cas/OFC?
1. Prologue

"_We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience." -Pierre Teilhard de Chardin_

-O-

Part of the warehouse was sectioned off. Tarps were hung down over a corner, and light shone from between the white cloth like sun through spread fingers. A heavy border of salt lined the perimeter. Three different songs of completely different genres were playing to echo through the empty, otherwise cold warehouse. The bright corner was filled with paintings of all sorts, from children's scribbles with crayon to prints of classics; The Last Supper was poised higher, a sign of respect.

Amongst the pillows and woven blankets, tatamis and an out-of-place fauteuil, lots of mismatched memorabilia was piled. A hookah, chess boards, a rarely-used television, a record player that looked like it was from the 1930s, a myriad bunch of instruments including but not limited to accordions and timpani drums, pressed flowers and preserved butterflies, and a bookshelf filled with nothing but classics were just a few of the many things gathered. There were also clothes from many different cultures, scattered bits of technology like the guts of computers, potted bamboo grass, statues of every deity from Buddha to Ganesh to Jesus, carved blades, light bulbs hanging from the ceiling, a parrot in a cage, rolled up flags, stacked vinyl records, and a bowl of wet dirt that had sprouted a wide variety of interesting fungi.

And amongst even those things, a woman was sitting, curled up in the chaos like another one of the many strange things. She was paging through a book of Latin, looking almost bored with it. A black dress was draped over her crossed knees, and a small vial of holy water hung around her neck by a silver chain. From the light of various candles and stained-glass lamps, the shadows of what looked like wings were cast over the tarp behind her.

The tiniest of breezes, almost unnoticeable, stirred her. She looked up, green eyes flashing, and saw the person standing in her domain. He was a handsome man in a suit and trench coat, with black hair that stuck up here and there.

It took her a moment to recognise him. "Castiel." She greeted with a nod. "What brings you here?"

"Charmeine. I require your assistance with something." He answered, his voice a perpetual growl.

She stood. "Of course."

"It is long term. This is important, but I believe you will enjoy it nonetheless."

"Tell me."

"I will inform you on the way." Castiel placed his hand on her shoulder and they vanished.

-o-

The pair was in the room of the motel, stalling time. Castiel was leaning against the wall, deep in thought, arms crossed over his chest. Charmeine sat cross-legged on one of the beds, hands clasped in her lap.

"So," She broke the silence. "You want me to…sit on their shoulders."

Castiel pressed his mouth into a line. "I understand if you don't want to."

"I do. However, humans are often…unsettled by me."

Castiel glanced at her. "To the best of your ability, make sure they do not do anything foolish."

"From what you've told me, that will not be easy."

"You have an appetite for humans. I'm sure you will fare well."

_-o-_

_I just need to get this out of my system, okay? I don't want to continue it, I might, I don't know, just please god someone rescue me from this fandom. _

_-I chose the name Charmeine because she's the angel of harmony, and there aren't very many good female angel names. I like to pronounce it "CHAR-mine" but I'm pretty sure it's closer to "Char-MEEN". _


	2. More Than Meets the Eye

Charmeine smelled them almost before she saw them. The young one, Sam, emitted an eye-watering stench like brimstone and copper blood, and she had to exhale through her nose. Dean wasn't bad—there was some residual on him from being around his brother, but his scent was less noticeable, probably because he smelled more like herself and Castiel.

Dean nodded to Castiel when they walked in. "Hey, Cas. You bring your girlfriend this time?"

"No." Castiel pushed off the wall he was leaned on and faced them. "This is Charmeine. She's a specialist."

"Whoa, hey, the last time you brought a "specialist", he went all Cold War Russia on a town."

"I don't specialise in destruction, like Uriel." Charmeine got off the bed and approached them. "I specialise in humans."

Sam gave her a look. "Humans? Why?"

"I find them—you—fascinating." She replied easily.

"I cannot always hover over you." Castiel cut in, looking to the brothers. "Charmeine has agreed to…take over that position. It's beneficial for all parties." He added at their looks.

"We don't need a guard dog." Dean snapped.

"Castiel is right." Charmeine argued. "I can study in the…what is the term…in the _field, _Castiel can take care of matters elsewhere and you will gain extra knowledge and a pair of hands. As for my relation to canines, I assure you my bark is worse than my bite, as the saying goes."

Sam pulled his brother aside for a moment, and though he lowered his voice it did little. "Maybe we should think about it. She could help, right?"

The older Winchester looked reluctant. "Angels…" He muttered.

"I know, I know, but think." Sam tapped his temple. "Holy power on our side, right?"

"So, what, God's got a direct link to everything we're doing?"

"If it offers you any comfort," Charmeine chimed in. "I will not be with you at all times, but when I arrive I will stay longer, as I have more free "time" than Castiel."

The brothers looked at each other, made a couple considering faces and weighing motions with their hands, then nodded and turned back to her. "Okay. You're in."

-O-

"The Incredible Hulk?"

"Yeah, apparently. Unless the lady's poppin' some weird drugs, we've got a superhero on our hands."

Charmeine frowned. "I don't know what that is."

"Seriously? You're the hairless ape expert, right? The Hulk is like, the ultimate hairless ape." While Dean talked, Charmeine reached up as though to take a book from an invisible bookshelf, and a small leather-bound notebook appeared in her hands. Flipping through it, it appeared to contain thousands of pages despite its thinness.

"Here." She stopped on a page and read through it. "Ah. I see." She threw it over her shoulder, but it vanished before it hit the floor. "I find that possibility highly unlikely."

"But it's a possibility, right?"

"In all technicality, anything and everything is a possibility at any given second because probability is determined on random waves."

"Yeah, whatever." Dean shrugged. "Hey, if you can pull stuff out of thin air, doesn't that make you an archangel?"

"No." She sighed and pressed her palms together, thinking, and offered no further explanation.

-o-

The Impala rolled up to the warehouse and crunched to a stop in the wet gravel outside. The Winchesters got out of the car and grabbed the carved wooden stakes from the trunk. When they closed it, Charmeine was sitting on the roof of the car.

"Remember who you are dealing with." She told them. "The Trickster is nothing to trifle with. Even I may fall to his tricks while we are in there. Believe nothing you see."

"Thanks for the pep talk, Char." Dean marched purposely toward the warehouse door. "But really, I think we can handle one little Trickster."

She appeared in front of them at the door and tapped the top of his head with her notebook. "Dean Winchester, if there is one thing I am not going to do it's mop up your remains." He blinked in surprise. "That…was affectionate violence. Right?"

"Er…right." He glanced at Sam, who looked somewhere between amused and confused. "Let's just get this over with, 'kay?"

They walked past her and closed the door behind them. Tucking her notebook away, Charmeine walked after them.

The second she stepped through, she grasped for the door behind her, but it was already gone. Too late, far too late. She found herself in a household, which looked to be from around the 1960s or 70s. The garish hues and geometrical architecture was a good reminder of why she'd taken a short holiday from Earth during those years. She was wearing a pink and white polka-dotted dress with a green apron, holding a pot roast. Her black hair, short and prim around her chin, was pushed back by a pink hairband. A laugh track of cheering quietly chimed in when she appeared.

"Be quiet." She snapped at the invisible audience.

A boy of maybe 12 or 13 ran down the stairs and into the kitchen. "Hey mom, what's for dinner?"

"Uh…this?" Charmeine gestured to the roast.

"Gross. Can I go to Bobby's for dinner?"

"I suppose that would be acceptable." A laugh track roared. "How was that amusing?"

"Rad, thanks mom." The boy ran off, and from down the stairs came a man in a suit with a jacket over his elbow.

"I'm off to work, honey!" He practically sang, and jogged over to kiss her cheek.

She jerked away. "Trickster."

"Oh, I'm not that bad!" Her "husband" walked to the door. "See ya tomorrow morning!"

When the door closed behind him, Charmeine tore off her apron and oven mitts, and attempted to fly away, to no avail. Frowning, she tried again. She could hear her wings moving, but they caught no traction. "Trickster! Enough of this!"

The laugh track chuckled deadly back at her. Snapping a stick of chalk from the air, she knelt on the linoleum floor and began to draw a sigil onto the tile. She stood in it, cut her hand with one of the knives on the kitchen counter, and murmured a few guttural words before vanishing.

To her dismay, the sigil only transported her to another section of the Trickster's map. She was sitting at the edge of a bathtub, accompanied by maybe a dozen other mortal women. They all were dressed in bikinis that left little to the imagination. Her teeth hurt from gritting them so hard.

The door to the bath was flung open, and standing in the doorway was a blond, grinning man. "Hello, ladies." He purred.

Charmeine stood and stalked up to him. "Enough. I won't play your game."

"What game, baby? We got plenty of games here."

She set her hand on his forehead, and his appearance morphed into a smirking, impish man. "This game." She snarled.

"Oh, you take all the fun out of things." The Trickster pouted without dropping his smile. "You know, it's awfully fun to toy with you and the boys. Such a good Scooby Doo Gang you three make."

"What do you want from us?"

"Nothing! Well, from you." He walked around her in a circle—time had frozen but for them, the girls in the tub poised throwing handfuls of soapy water at each other. "It's the vessels I'm interested in, really. The wittle bitty Winchester boys that you're playing nanny to—good job on that, by the way. What's this, the first week on the job and the babies are already drowning in the tub while you prance through the household with your annoyingly _nosy_ angel boyfriend?"

"Why are you interested in them?" She asked, circling opposite him like two fighters in a ring. "The vessels are under my protection and I will defend them."

"Don't bother, Nancy Drew." The Trickster snorted. "I'm not going to _kill_ them. Quite the opposite, actually. Just a bit of wheedling here, bit of persuasion here, and it's pretty easy to get the little humans to do whatever I want."

She narrowed her eyes. "You aren't a Trickster, are you?"

"A magician never reveals his secrets." He tapped the side of his nose. "I just want the humans to play their roles as destiny wrote them. This is all just practise."

"Lucifer is on the rise and there is little we can do to stop it. The last thing we need is to be trapped in this maze of tricks, whatever your motives."

"Tricks!" He laughed. "Silly rabbit. Tricks are for kids."

And with a snap of his fingers, she was popped away to another channel.

-o-

_-I guess I'm just doing episodes I like. I'll be doing less episode-based ficlets in the coming chapters, I just really love Gab and the TV episode. We all know how it ends, though, so this is all it'll be._

_-Review! 3_


	3. Ghostfacers!

The motel room smelled like greasy hamburgers and fries. Dean sat on one of the beds with a fifth of whiskey in his hand, a burger in the other. Sam slurped from a soda, frowning at an Internet page. "Looks like just a standard haunting to me." He said appraisingly. "A couple people killed in the area, the house is abandoned. Some woman named Victoria Hansen was killed by her husband there a few decades ago."

"Well, looks like we got some exorcising to do." His brother replied, popping the rest of the burger in his mouth.

"Hello." Charmeine appeared on the other bed, journal in hand.

"Hey, Char." Sam said. "Want some fries?"

She glanced at him. "Some what?"

The brothers exchanged a look. "You're serious?"

"When are they _not _serious…?" Dean muttered.

Charmeine snapped a prim black quill from the air and dipped it in an invisible well of ink. She stepped over to Sam and picked up one of the fries. She let it hover midair while she wrote something down, then grabbed it and ate it in one swallow without chewing.

She cleared her throat. "You should immediately burn all of this."

Sam looked taken aback. "Uh, why?"

"Because I am going to eat all of it in a few seconds and possibly everything like it in the next several miles."

Dean stood and looked at Sam. "Burn it?"

"Burn it." He nodded back.

They burned it. While the remains of the fast food roasted, Dean clapped his hands together. "Right! Well, I think it's ghostin' time."

-o-

The door to the house creaked open as the brothers entered. Charmeine was already inside, looking around curiously and watching them as they explored. Her journal hovered beside her head, the quill scribbling away as usual. Dean gave it an annoyed look, waving his flashlight like it would make it go away.

"Do you have to do that? We're tryin' to work here." He swatted at it like an insect.

"I am observing human's reactions to situations under stress. The adrenal glands excrete a substance that—"

"Yeah, adrenaline." Sam said. "We know."

"I find the feeling most invigorating when my vessel reacts similarly." She noted.

"Yeah, well, for us mortals it usually just means that we're about to get ganked." Dean snarked.

The trio rounded a corner to a sitting room. The red upholstery was peeling and the gray stuffing was exposed like innards. A grandfather clock in the corner was stopped at quarter after three. Heavy layers of dust made the house look even more washed out and gray than it already was. There was one thing that was very out of place, however: sat in the centre of the room, with the furniture pushed back, was a long table full of various computers. Large construction lamps were set up to face the middle of the room.

Charmeine appeared behind all the monitors, staring with fascination. "What is the purpose behind all of this?"

"Oh, no." The other two grumbled together.

She looked up and frowned. "What?"

They pointed at a large case lying off to the side. On it was a dramatic graphic that read, "Ghostfacers!"

"More hunters?" Charmeine asked.

"In the roughest sense of the term." Sam judged with no lack of sarcasm. "Let's go, guys, Vicky can teach 'em a lesson."

"I suggest we find information on this spirit before we leave." She told them. "I will search the house."

"No, Char, don't…" Their feeble warnings were ignored, and she was gone. Dean shook his head. "Friggin' angels!"

Charmeine appeared in several rooms in half as many seconds, but something caught her attention. A man was creeping through a hall, glowing like a torch, and talking to himself. She frowned and walked towards him. He couldn't be a ghost, for dust moved under his feet. He was talking some nonsense about how the house _felt_. He put great emphasis on the word, and it confused her.

She went back to the Winchesters. "I think I found one of the other hunters." She said.

But the brothers weren't alone. A young Asian woman and a skinny man, who looked more like a boy to her eyes, were standing a distance away from Sam and Dean, and neither party looked very pleased to see the other. The two she did not know were staring at her.

"Where did she come from?" The man asked shakily.

"Oh my God, she's a ghost! It's old Victoria!" The woman panicked. "Quick, Harry, get the salt!"

Harry grabbed a tin of salt from his belt and tossed it at Charmeine. She brushed it away and turned to her friends. "Why do they think I'm a spirit?"

"They're idiots, Char."

"Hey!" The other two exclaimed. "We aren't idiots." Harry snapped.

"And anyway, if you aren't a ghost, what are you?" The girl asked.

"Wait, Maggie, get it on camera." Harry said, and Maggie produced a small handheld recorder. "Okay, okay…we have here an anomaly unlike anything we've seen, Ghostfacers. No reaction to salt, and yet, uh, she appeared _right_ before us and _appears_ sentient."

She reached forward and coolly, easily crunched the camera in her hand. Maggie squeaked and flinched away. "I am an angel of the Lord."

Harry dropped the act for a moment. "Yeah, right. Even we know those don't exist."

Water, which she knew just by touch was holy, was quite suddenly splashed over her head from someone behind her. "Gotcha!" It was the man in the hallway from earlier, and behind him was another with another camera.

Charmeine shook out her hair and looked to Dean and Sam. "Okay, Char, just…calm down." Sam said. "No smiting…"

Without any storm or precursor, lightning flashed outside the sitting room window, and her wings spread on the wall behind her in shadows. There was silence in the room for a beat. Then, from the guy who had poured holy water on her, "Oh, man, this is gold."

The angel was clearly close to pulling some holy soldier crap on them, so she simply turned to the Winchesters. "Victoria Hansen is buried in the back yard. Bring shovels."

Standing over the grave, she waited until the brothers came out with shovels and salt. To her irritation, the camera crew came along. For her friends' sakes, she held up a small ball of gold light in the palm of her hand. They started digging, and while they did, she sat by the grave and dully answered the Ghostfacers' probing questions.

"So you come from Heaven, right?"

"Yes."

"Have you seen God?"

"No."

"Are there more angels?"

"Yes."

"How old are you?"

"I lost count."

"Can you fly? Like with wings?"

"In a way."

"What do you look like upstairs?"

She sighed. "I have four wings, six arms and three heads which are respectively a tiger, a snowstorm and a mass of raw energy more powerful than your Sun. I am as tall as your Empire State Building and wield a sword that is literally fire and a bow with arrows that are the very essence of a thunderstorm. The next person to ask me a question gets to see me in that form. Is this understood?"

There was a silence but for the sound of shovels digging into dirt. "Yes ma'am." Henry said timidly.

-o-

When the ghost was burned and the Ghostfacers' memories and hard drives wiped, they returned to the motel to pack the next morning. When they got there, Dean with a customary glass of whiskey in hand—"It's six 'o' clock somewhere!"—and Sam packing up his modest technology, Charmeine appeared with a milkshake in her hand.

"Mortal food is very addictive." She said lightly, tipping the Styrofoam cup back to drink it. "Especially this frozen, artificially flavoured milk drink."

"We've created a monster." Dean chuckled. "Welcome to America, Char."

"Anyway, is that true what you said to the Ghostfacers?" Sam added, tucking his laptop away.

"Is what true?" She stopped drinking for a moment to raise an eyebrow at him.

"Is that really how you look? Up there, I mean. In Heaven."

"Oh, you mean all that about thunderstorms and six arms? No, that was a lie." She shrugged, gave a tiny smile, like it was exciting to not be one hundred percent truthful, and sipped at her milkshake. "Most of it."

_-o-_

_-So I don't really know what I'm doing anymore lol, please review!_


	4. A Detour

"_I cannot even imagine where I would be today were it not for that handful of friends who have given me a heart full of joy. Let's face it, friends make life a lot more fun." –Charles R. Swindoll_

The Winchesters walked along the path in the park, their shoes splashing in the dirty slush. Their breath made little clouds in the air behind them. "Remind me," Dean chattered. "Never to come to Wisconsin again."

"I want to jump into a fire." Sam desperately drank his extra hot triple red-eye.

"You would still be cold." Dean sniffed and puffed out his cheeks.

"Hello." Charmeine appeared between them, eating fast food restaurant soft serve from a plastic dish. They glanced at each other over her head.

"You're eating _ice cream_?" Dean asked incredulously. "In _this_ weather?"

"My vessel, Quinn," She ate an absurdly large bite. "She is deeply inclined to foods with, uh, high amounts of sugar in them."

"You're like Cas that one time with Famine. Couldn't keep the poor bastard away from hamburgers. So, you don't…" He waved a hand. "Feel cold?"

"No." She thought. "Yes. I can feel my vessel feeling cold, but I," She tapped her chest. "I, myself, cannot."

"Huh. So you mean I can do this?"

Charmeine jumped in surprise when he threw a snowball, and it hit her square in the face. Sam put a hand to his mouth to cover his laughter as snow melted into her ice cream. Dean chuckled. "Come on, throw one back!"

She blinked and wiped her face off. "Why?"

He paused. "What, you mean you've never had a snowball fight before?"

Predictably, her journal appeared in her hand and pages rifled. "That's an intriguing interaction. More affectionate violence, correct?"

"Aw, don't go all angel on me now. Come on, loosen up. We'll even get Cas in on the action." Before she could protest, Dean dramatically clasped his hands together, closed his eyes, and looked up to the sky. Next to him, Sam began creating an arsenal. "O Castiel, who art in Heaven or wherever the hell you really are, we pray to you to get your trench coat-ed ass down here. Amen."

"Hello, Dean." They turned and saw Cas standing in the path behind them. "What do you need?"

Charmeine opened her mouth to warn him of the plan, but a snowball hit him in the face before she could. He looked utterly shocked, eyes wide and bits of snow stuck in his hair. The brothers roared with laughter, while Castiel continued to look utterly baffled. He looked to the resident human "expert". "What is the appropriate response to this?"

She looked it up in her journal. "Retaliation."

"With the snow?"

"Yes. Apparently." She knelt and attempted to imitate what she had seen them do, and threw it. It hit Sam's shoulder, and they paused in their laughter to look briefly surprised.

"Oh, here we go." Dean clapped his hands together once. "The battle that was always meant to be, right? Angels versus humans. Bring it, you holy sons of bitches!"

It was an innocent enough fight. At first. The angels had trouble figuring out how to keep the snow in a sphere form, so the brothers granted them mercy by using their time to build a mountain. Cas spent five minutes making one snowball, sitting cross-legged in the snow and utterly failing at it. It was like watching a two-year-old trying to make a sandcastle. Of course, once Char interfered and they managed to make about a dozen lopsided weapons, things got serious. Dean and Sam had cleared an entire swatch of grass in a six-foot radius, and had made a wall and an enormous arsenal. They were veterans, masters of the fight. This was something they were trained to do, all the way from childhood winters. Char and Cas stood defenseless with a couple snowballs apiece.

Dean raised a fist. "Charge!" His brother echoed the war cry, and it was officially on. The older brother threw the first one, like a baseball, at unreasonable speeds, and Cas neatly reached up and caught it, which turned it to clumps. Sam's missed Char by about two feet when she sidestepped it.

"Oh we are so totally screwed." Dean muttered.

-o-

Charmeine brushed snow from her hair, her journal writing down notes in the "Field Notes" section, at page about two thousand. "That was an enjoyable experience." She said.

Dean and Sam were both gasping for breath, leaning on each other. "How the hell did we lose?" Sam gasped. "We never lose!"

"We won?" Castiel asked.

"Yes, Cas, I think we did." Charmeine replied.

He grinned in his small, reserved way. "You're right. That was enjoyable."

"Okay, you smug bastards." Dean blew a foggy breath into his fist and stretched. "I'm about done with Cheeseville for today. Let's get some hot cocoa."

They went to the nearest coffee shop and bought the hottest drinks available, and forced the angels to drink as well even though it made no difference. "You're bleeding." Cas pointed out eventually.

Char tapped her cheek, and her hand came back bloody. "Yes, I believe one of Sam's snowballs had a stone in it. It should heal in an hour or two."

In response, he touched her cheek. If stroking a woman's face could be accomplished in a businesslike manner, Castiel would be the one to do it. But the bleeding cut vanished, and they both dismissed the gesture.

-o-

_-Ultra short chapter because I can! The next one should be longer. _

_-As always, review, my lovely readers!_


	5. Not So Secret Admirers

"_Ever since I started to get recognition I've picked out certain fans and reverse-stalked them." –Jim Carrey_

The Impala screeched around the curve of the road, the tires squealing as they braked, then accelerated when the road straightened out. The destination was the parking lot of a little, nondescript inn out in the country. The slick car pulled into a spot and the brothers jumped out and ran to the front staircase of the inn, outside in the mild rainy weather. A man was pacing there.

"Chuck! There you are." Sam greeted as they jogged up to him.

"Guys?" He asked, clearly surprised to see them.

"What's going on?" Dean asked.

"Ah, nothing, you know, I'm just kinda hanging. What are you guys doing here?"

"You told us to come."

"Ah, no, I didn't."

"Yes, you did." Char appeared next to them, Sam's cell phone in her hand. "'Come to the Pineview Hotel. Life or death, please come right away'. Sent from your phone, I believe." She handed it back to him.

"I didn't send you a text." Chuck shook his head, looking increasingly worried.

"We drove all night!" Dean exclaimed.

"I'm sorry, I don't understand what could…oh, no." Chuck tried to usher them away, but a squeal made them look to the top of the stairs.

"_Sam! _You came!" A girl in tweed and high socks came running down the stairs to stop in front of the tall man.

"Oh…" He glanced at his brother, and the angel, then back at her. "Uh, Becky, right?"

The girl gasped. "You remembered. You've been thinking about me."

"Uh…"

"It's okay, I can't get you out of my head either." She said doefully, smiling and looking at him from under her eyelashes.

"Becky, did you steal my phone?" Chuck asked.

"I just borrowed it from your pants." She said innocently.

"Becky…"

"What? They're going to want to see it!"

"See what?" All three new arrivals asked at the same time.

"Oh my God. I love it when they talk at the same time!" Beck squealed. A man came outside with a clipboard and called to Chuck, who turned to them after Becky left.

"Guys, I'm sorry. For everything." He said regretfully, and followed the man inside the hotel.

They were led into the inn lobby, where many people were milling about. Something about it seemed very odd about them, though. Some were wearing clothes strikingly similar to Dean and Sam. One man walked past them, dressed in Dean's clothes down to the amulet, and nodded to the real Dean.

"Ha ha ha! Hey, Dean, lookin' good!" He laughed.

"Who the hell are you?" Dean demanded.

"I'm Dean too. Duh." The man walked away.

"Becky. What is this."

"It's _awesome!_ A Supernatural convention." Becky chimed in from behind them. "The first ever!"

The first thing that happened was that Char disappeared. Dean wished he could do that; typical angels. Instead, he and Sam wandered the lobby, staring at the copies of themselves and their friends. A few people were even dressed as Bobby, or notable spirits like the Hook Man and Bloody Mary. There were even people dressed as the angels, and he kept doing double-takes when someone in a trench coat or black dress would walk past. Some were wearing little fake black wings. It was surreal, like looking in a carnival mirror. While standing by the bar trying to decide who to be angry at first, his phone rang.

He sighed. "Hello?"

"Dean. You are still at the inn?"

"Char? Yeah, we're still here. What…" He pulled the phone away to frown at the dial tone, beeping at him. When he looked up, she was sitting at the bar next to him. "Where were you?"

"Sixty miles above the Atlantic Ocean. I needed a moment to clear my head." She brought out her journal and began writing with her own hand as she did when they were in other mortal company. "I find this event very disturbing. Do all humans do this?"

"God, I hope not." He muttered.

"Interesting." She dipped the quill in its invisible ink pot, even tapping it off on the edge. "I wish to investigate this."

"Jesus, Char." Dean grumbled, rubbing his temples.

"You know, let's just go." Sam said with a general body motion toward the door. He looked at Char's adamant expression and his face fell. "We aren't really staying, are we?"

"It is very eerie, I'll admit. I find it…_unsettling _to see people imitating me. I would like to…how does Bobby put it? Slap some sense into them. What we do is not a joke nor is it a game." She confessed, closing her notebook. "But it's interesting nonetheless."

There was no reasoning with her. The next stop was a convention room, where all of the guests had crowded in rows of seats. A man up on stage introduced Chuck, who walked awkwardly up on to stage. "Okay, okay good, this isn't nearly as awkward as I…" He cleared his throat a couple times. "Dry mouth." The convention waited as he took a water bottle and took a few deep, loud gulps from it. It was awkward beyond imagination. "Okay, uh…so I guess…questions?"

Every hand in the room shot up. "Uh…you?"

A skinny guy in the front row jumped to his feet. "Hi Mr Edlund, big fan, I was just wondering, where'd you come up with Sam and Dean in the first place?"

Chuck glanced back at the three standing. "Oh, uh, I…it just came to me." More hands raised. "Okay, yeah. The hook man."

A man dressed as the aforementioned ghost stood and spoke in a heavy German accent. "Ah, yeah. Why in every fight scene, Sam and Dean are having their gun knocked away by the bad guy? Why don't they keep it on some kind of bungee?"

"I…yeah, I really don't know." Chuck said awkwardly, put on the spot.

"_Ja, _follow up. Why is Dean not seeing that the angels are clearly using them for their own plans? I mean, they are obviously twisting him into doing what they want, _nein_?"

Becky stalked down the aisle to the row the hook man was standing in. "Hey! If you don't like the books don't read 'em, Fritz."

"Okay, okay, just…okay, it's okay. Next question. You?" Chuck tried to disperse the tension by choosing another fan.

A young woman dressed up as Sam stood. "Hi, um, speaking of the angels, there was clearly some sexual tension between Charmeine and Castiel in the last book. Will that be resolved soon?"

The brothers, eyebrows raised in unison, leaned forward to stare at Char, who was trying her best not to show any flavour of emotion. Chuck glanced back at them again, staring at the fire-eyed angel. "Uh, I don't, I-I'm working on it. Next question? Please?"

"Yeah, at the end of the last book, Sam starts the Apocalypse. So, what happens next?" A guy asked.

"Oh. Well there lies an announcement, actually. You're all going to find out." There was a pause. "Thanks to a wealthy Scandinavian investor, we're going to start publishing again."

The crowd jumped to its feet, applauding and cheering. Becky, next to them, jumped up and down, screaming happily. The brothers glared, and Char twisted her quill between two fingers, frowning.

-o-

"Well yes Agents Lennon and McCartney, as manager of this fine establishment I can assure you that it is indeed haunted. This building was once an orphanage, run by mean old Leticia Gore. 100 years ago this very night, Miss Gore went insane, and butchered four little boys before killing herself. Now folks say that the souls of those poor little boys are trapped here and the evil spirit of Miss Gore punishes them to this very day."

Dean, Sam and Charmeine watched the convention manager giving a speech to the fake Deans and Sams in FBI costumes. "Well, that's just about all the community theatre I can take." Dean decided.

"Yeah, this cannot get any weirder." Sam agreed.

Two cosplayers walked past, dressed as the brothers. "Dad said…he said I may have to kill you." The one dressed as Dean said in a fake growling voice.

"Kill me? What the hell does that mean?" The fake Sam responded in an equally faux growl.

"I don't know." Fake Dean said.

"Oh…" They walked off. The real Sam and Dean looked at each other; even Char looked up from her notebook to raise an eyebrow.

"I need a drink." The brothers said in unison, and walked off to the bar.

Charmeine sat a couple seats away from them, writing in depth about this new and disturbing phenomenon. Humans would never cease to confuse and awe her. A man sat next to her, dressed as Castiel, and grinned nervously. "H-hey."

"Hello."

"So, uh…Char, right?" He swallowed and gestured at her. "Good costume. The journal looks au-authentic."

"I bought it in a marketplace in Turkey. Well, then it was known as the Ottoman Empire. Beautiful poets."

"Wow, you, uh, you really do your research." He laughed awkwardly. "Can I, er, buy you a-a drink?"

She nodded absently. When the bartender brought the drink, she took a sip and glanced at him. "You look much like Castiel. However, your tie is too tight and you are too clean-shaven. He doesn't have the decency to look polished."

"Oh, I-I didn't have the to time to, ah, grow it out." He self-consciously rubbed his chin and loosened his tie. "So, you're a fan of the books?"

Char thought about it for a moment. "You could say that."

-o-

Sam ran onto the convention stage, where Chuck had returned with the cosplayers to answer questions again. He covered the microphone with his hand and whispered in his ear. "Hey…what? Holy crap!" Chuck exclaimed.

"You gotta keep everyone safe in here, Chuck. It's life or death."

"For how long?"

"As long as it takes."

Chuck looked stressed. "Well, how the hell am I supposed to do that?"

"I don't know, man, just do it. Char'll help out, I guess." Sam looked over his shoulder to the angel, waiting for him behind the stage. She widened her eyes and looked behind her, then pointed to herself. He nodded and beckoned, walking off stage.

"Okay. So, ahh, good news. I've got much more to tell you, I guess." Chuck sighed.

-o-

"No, there's no such thing as a Croatoan virus for _down there_. You really should see a doctor." Chuck was sitting at the edge of the stage, bored as the rest of the fans. "Yeah, you."

"Hey, Char lady, can I have your number?"

Charmeine refreshed the ink in her quill and continued drawing the little picture of Castiel in her journal. He was smiling. "No."

Chuck glanced at what she was doing. He covered the mic with his hand and leaned over. "Hey, pull some angel crap or something so there's something to do in here."

"I don't really want to do that."

"Why not? They're getting bored, and if we don't do something they'll leave before Sam and Dean can finish."

"When we reveal ourselves to humans, usually they..." She gestured with her hand. "Want something from us. Miracles. 'My uncle is dying!' 'I'm going bald!' It's all the same. We can't grant favors most of the time. Hence, I would prefer to be seen as someone in a costume."

"Oh, come on! Please?" Chuck bounced up and down. "We gotta keep these people interested!"

"Hey, I have a question for Char." Someone said. Chuck pointed to him. "Would you…maybe wanna get coffee sometime?"

Char stopped and took a deep breath, repeating the same mantra in her head: no smiting the stupid ones. No smiting the stupid ones. Chuck gave her a 'see, I told you' kind of look. She shook her head.

-o-

"Let's see, what else…" Chuck thought for a moment. "Oh, I fell in love for the first time when I was 16. Lost my virginity, actually. But she went around saying it didn't happen, so…"

One of the staff members in the back stood and began to leave. That caught both Chuck and Charmeine's attention, for the door were salted, and opening the door would break that line and allow spirits in. "Oh, no, you can't leave!" Chuck called. The manager shook his head and reached for the handle. "Don't open that door!"

The line of salt was pushed away, and almost immediately the flickering spirit of a young boy was at the door, smiling and holding a knife. The manager fell back in shock; people screamed. Before it could enter, Chuck ran forward with an iron stand and banished the ghost away. He slammed the door closed.

"Nobody leaves! Now somebody salt this damn door!" Still holding the metal stand, he walked back to where Char was standing, arms crossed. "Thanks for the help!"

"I was confident you could handle it." She responded lightly.

"Yeah, and what if it didn't work? Would you have let everyone in here be scalped?" He demanded.

She levelled her gaze with him. "If the ghost had broken past and posed a real threat to innocents, I would have interfered. However, you handled it well. There was no need."

Their argument was attracting the attention of the guests. Chuck still had his dander up, and in the front row Becky was sending him "come hither" looks. A few people clapped, but the room was tense. They probably thought the argument was some kind of act. Char frowned out at them and disappeared, leaving to the graveyard.

The fake Dean and Sam had dug up the graves of the boys, and the Dean was struggling to ignite the lighter in his hand. "How come Dean always gets it on the first freaking try? Come on!" More sparks.

"Here." Char reached over his shoulder, making him yelp in alarm, and touched the lighter. It flared up immediately, and he threw it onto the bodies.

Her next stop was Sam and Dean, who seemed to have been in a tight spot with the boys' spirits before the bodies were burned. They looked up at her arrival. "Nice of you to show up." Dean grunted, getting to his feet. "Having fun with the costume brigade?"

"No. It was dull."

"Can't say the same for ourselves." Sam brushed himself off and took a quick breath. "Let's get the hell out of here."

-o-

_-Continuity errors BECAUSE I CAN_

_-I changed how far along Chuck's books went because otherwise no one would have any reaction toward Char._

_-Review! 3 _


	6. Whitechapel Part 1

"_I really liked the snake that breaks out of the cage in the beginning of [the Philosopher's Stone]. I saw it in real life, and it was really cool. Really big and fat. The owls are cool as well, but you can't really pet them." –Tom Felton_

There was a faint rustling in the motel room as Char appeared. Sam glanced up from his computer screen, Dean from cleaning his dismantled gun. The latter did a double take, however, at the sight of her. "Jesus, what the hell is that?" His voice broke slightly.

The angel stood in the middle of the room, mildly watching an enormous black snake curl around her neck and circle her torso. It was a massive, writhing thing with white under its chin and neck. When its head came around hers to hover over her ear, it revealed yellow eyes the size of quarters.

"Char…why is there a boa constrictor in the motel room?" Sam asked warily, standing defensively.

"I was passing through the east coast and picked it up on the way." She stated as though it were no more than the Sunday weather. She held out her arm, and its scales could be heard hissing along her skin. "Fascinating creature."

"It's not going to…" Dean swallowed. "Eat you, is it?"

"Of course not. You fight the unnatural for a living. One little reptile shouldn't be so frightening."

"_Little?"_

She pried the snake off of her, untangling from its seemingly infinite midnight scales, and let it fall to the floor with a smooth _thump._ "As for it _eating _me, this particular species is preyed _on_ by humans." It rubbed its eye over her finger, and she smiled. "I doubt you have anything to worry about."

The snake uncoiled from its tangle and began coasting over the floor. Spread out, it was at least six feet long, maybe more, a long black rope of muscle. Dean stayed on the bed; Sam actually pulled his feet up onto his chair like a housewife hiding from a mouse. Char sat on the floor. The snake explored the room, probing and letting its forked tongue dart out to smell the air. It soon returned to her, though, and lifted its head to coil around her shoulders.

Hardly blinking, she took a bar of chocolate from the ether and started eating. "Any information on the deaths yet?"

Sam stared at her in some kind of horrified confusion for a moment before turning to the computer. "Uh…yeah, actually, yes. The first woman had her throat cut and the second had her uterus removed. Not found so we can assume whatever killed them has it. Oh, and they were all women between 20 and 25."

"Demon Casanova." Dean added from the bed.

"Right, but it sounds a bit more like something else. See, the M.O. perfectly fits that of another killer, a long time ago. And I mean a _long _time ago."

Dean held out his hands, holding a rag and barrel of his pistol. "Who?"

"The Whitechapel murderer, or Leather Apron. Otherwise known as Jack the Ripper."

"Jack the Ripper? Really? Why's he out here in po-dunk central?"

"I don't know. We'll have to look into that. But there's another thing you may like."

"What's that?"

Sam quirked his head and raised his eyebrows. "All the victims were strippers."

"Hey, now we're talkin'!" Dean clapped his hands and clicked his pistol together, all clean. "What are we waiting for? Let's go!"

-o-

The lights of the strip club were dim and red, the music pumping. To Charmeine, it smelled of sin and lonely souls. Her new companion wrapped fearfully around her neck like a heavy necklace. Keeping her eyes firmly away from the dancing, essentially naked women, in her reluctance she continued writing in her journal.

The brothers went to interrogate the club owner, and she stayed at a table while she waited for them. Already she was growing fond of her reptilian friend and began thinking of names. A man leaned and slurred something drunkenly at her. She cringed away. The club made her feel almost physically ill.

Sam and Dean came back and leaned against the table next to her. "So, the owner doesn't know much. Can't keep track of all the girls." Sam said.

"This place makes me very uncomfortable." She muttered to the pages. "I have been thinking of what to call this animal and have decided on the title Nanba."

"You aren't really gonna keep that thing, are you?" Dean groaned. "It's creepy."

"He doesn't mean it, Nanba." Char rubbed the side of the snake's head.

Dean rolled his eyes, and Sam stepped in to disperse the tension. "Let's get back to the case. We should hit town hall, they might have some answers to this connection to the Ripper." His brother made a reluctant face. "Fine, stay here with the strippers. Make sure none of them leave with any shady characters."

"Awesome." Dean nodded and looked out over the club, the women, the alcohol. "Yeah, I'll just stay here for now. You guys can go nerd out at town hall tomorrow."

Char returned them to the motel room to wait out the night. She seemed to find some kind of amusement in letting the snake constrict her arms. Sam furrowed his brow slightly and smiled. "You really like that thing, huh?"

"It is a beautiful creature." She teased her finger near its mouth, but it refused to bite her.

"Can you…" He shrugged. "Read its mind?"

"Yes. It thinks of little else but small rodents." She blinked thoughtfully. "Also it seems to believe you are a small tree."

He pursed his lips. "Thanks."

-o-

Charmeine sat at the end of their beds, in a chair overlooking the room. Nanba was curled in her lap, sleeping without eyelids. It was utter dark in the room, and only when a car passed outside the window did she see the tall shape in the corner. "Hello, Castiel."

"Charmeine." He greeted.

"You should have come in the day." She ran a finger down Nanba's scales. "They miss you."

He cocked his head and looked over the beds. "They pray for me in their dreams."

Char nodded. "Yes, I know. What interesting dreams these two have. Dreams of smoke and fire some times, and other times…it could be Heaven." She looked up at him. "Where have you been?"

Castiel inclined his head. "Attempting to track down all of the Seals. I came because I believe you may have just found one."

-o-

_-Dun dun dun! Continued in part 2!_

_-This roughly takes place in S4, which is now pretty obvious, but emphasis on "roughly". _

_-Review! Because I love you!_


	7. Whitechapel Part 2

"_Now I know what a ghost is. Unfinished business, that's what." __-Salman Rushdie, __The Satanic Verses_

Now that _was _interesting. Charmeine stood, gathering Nanba into her hands so he wouldn't wake. "You mean to say that…"

"Yes." Castiel clasped his hands. "The deaths of these women will follow the pattern of Jack the Ripper. The Seal mustn't break, we've already lost far too many."

Char nodded. "Then we need to stop him."

"Immediately." Cas agreed. He looked her over and frowned. "Why are you holding a snake?"

"I have adopted it." She felt it contract and warp in her hands, a defense mechanism, meaning it had woken up. It hissed softly and arched up, eyeing Cas defensively. Char scratched the top of its head with her fingernail.

He pressed his lips into a line. "Well, find what is keeping the Ripper tied to this town and banish him before he can kill the last three. If the spirit re-murders his canonical five victims the Seal will break."

"I remember when they were killed the first time." She mused. "Unpleasant."

"I'll leave you to it. If you should encounter him and find it too much a challenge…"

"I know." She gave a small, humourless smile. "But you know as well as I that I will be fine."

He watched her for a moment, with something along the lines of concern, but flew away a moment later. Charmeine debated with herself for a few moments, did a count of the days and looked at the time before deciding to wake the boys up.

"Ugh..." Sam groaned and sat up, fumbling for his phone. "Char?"

"This better be pretty friggin' important…" Dean muttered, rubbing his eyes.

"Dean, Sam, this situation has recently become much more serious."

Dean popped his neck and rolled his shoulders. "What do you mean?"

"I mean these murders are a Seal." At their looks, she held up a hand. "It hasn't broken, yet. The spirit of Jack the Ripper will kill three more. If they die, his rage will be set free and the Seal will break."

There was a pause. "Well, who's he gonna kill?" Dean finally asked.

"I have been looking into it. There are three remaining women in this town who have the same names as the remaining Ripper victims. I will pay a visit to the…"

She trailed off and looked out the window. A second or two later, ambulance sirens wailed down the street outside the motel, accompanied by blurs of red lights. "I'm guessing that's our third victim." Sam muttered.

"We're too late. Find what's keeping him here." Char warned. "I'm going to see Catherine Eddowes."

In a blink, she was in a small flat. It was a bit worse for the wear. A television was flickering cartoons in the faces of three small children with bowls of dry cereal in their laps. The flat was dirty, and dark. Char walked through the main room to the bedroom. Bottles of wine sat on the table next to the bed, lingerie was strewn across the floor. A woman sat on the bed, counting her money, and gasped when she saw Char.

"Who are you? How'd you get in here?" She demanded. Curly brown hair was strewn in dry strands across her painted face.

"Do not be afraid. I've come to help." She held out her hands, practised at such encounters.

"Why are you in my house?" Catherine asked shakily. "And _who are you_?"

"I am an angel of the Lord, and you are in terrible danger." Char beckoned. "Come, quickly, or your life will soon be in jeopardy."

"I'm not going anywhere with you! You're crazy! Get out, or I'm calling—"

One of the children in the living room screamed. Char whispered to Nanba, who hissed in acknowledgement and reared. A figure shadowed the door and moved closer. He was dressed like a well-to-do man of the 1800s, but his face was blurred, like a picture that had been scratched out. He walked silently toward her and the screaming Catherine, a scalpel in his hand.

Char lunged forward with an iron knife, but he had shifted past her. Nanba shot from her shoulders and wrapped around the spirit, constricting his ghostly throat for long enough that she could stab him. The snake fell to the floor when the Ripper vanished.

"Wh-what the hell was that thing?" The crying woman asked.

"An image of a thing long dead." Char sighed, observing her clean knife. "A spirit."

"That was a _ghost_?!" Catherine stood, shaking her head. "No, no, I'm outta here. Get away from me! I'm taking my kids and leaving!"

"You have to come with me, please." Char grabbed Nanba and appeared in front of the fleeing Elizabeth, who cried out in panic. "I don't mean to alarm you, but…"

"No! It's back!" She pointed over the angel's shoulder, and directly behind her was Jack the Ripper. He grabbed Char and tossed her to the side, and she smashed into the shelf of wine.

Glass cutting her hands as she stood, Char reached the Ripper at subsonic speeds. To her shock, he reached up and grabbed her hair, and threw her to the side again. A horrible, glass-shattering scream was cut off by a gurgle, and then silence. Charmeine stood and went at him again, feeling fire burning at her hands, and when she came out of her furious daze, the Ripper was gone, and Catherine was on the floor, her throat cut.

With a defeated sigh, Char knelt and murmured a prayer for her life. She closed Catherine's staring eyes, and strode into the living room. Nanba was tight around her throat in terror. The three children were crying loudly in the living room. Char knelt and picked them up, speaking quiet Enochian words to calm them, and appeared outside the town's orphanage.

When she was sure the children would be safe, she took out her cell phone and called Sam. "Yeah." He answered.

"Catherine Eddowes has been killed. Have you found what is binding the Ripper to this town?"

"Uh, I think we did. It's not gonna be easy, though. We're at the town hall, second room in the hall to the right…" He stopped and looked up at her, blinking. "Hi."

"Hello." She hung up. "What have you found?"

Sam gestured to a plaque. "Well, apparently there are some bricks in the road that are from England. Whitechapel. The town bought them for aesthetics about the time the first killings started."

"Then we destroy the bricks." She said simply.

"Yeah, except that means tearing up the roads, and I doubt the cops are gonna be thrilled about that. Plus, we have no way of knowing which ones are which." Dean crossed his arms. "There any other way of icing this creep? Where's his bones?"

"He was never identified." Sam sighed. "The Ripper was anonymous. He could have been anyone."

"Even I must admit that he eluded me." Char admitted. "There were many candidates."

"Great, freakin great. Now what?" Dean paced back and forth in front of the plaque.

Sam rubbed his chin, thinking. "We should find the last victim and keep her safe. What's her name?"

"Mary Jane Kelly." Char mumbled past her hand, pressed to her mouth in contemplation. "A very gruesome death. There were exceptions made to let her soul into our Gates just for the suffering she endured."

"Okay, Char, go to find her and make sure the Ripper doesn't kill her. Me and Sam'll try to find a way to get him before he gets to her. C'mon Sammy." Dean gestured to his brother and they walked out of the town hall.

_-o-_

_-If you're wondering, the stray snake she's picked up is a black rat snake. It's a pretty common breed on the east coast US. Nanba is like six feet I think? Which is like average size. And rat snakes do actually contract and wiggle their bodies up as a defense mechanism; it's kinda funky looking._

_-Review!_


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